Free NEXT BEST HOPE (The Revelation Trilogy) by Stephen Woodfin Page B

give him free rein at this stage of the operation? I’m afraid his loyalty to you may diminish as more Christian Militants swoon over him. It’s awfully hard for a young man to tune out the siren songs of ambition,” Nussbaum said.
    “I’ve given it much thought over the last weeks,” Westmoreland said. “I think we need to watch him carefully, but there is little I can do from this jail.”
    “This book plus the raid at Shiloh will keep you in the public eye ’til we can get you out of here. I’ll handle your PR while you’re confined,” Nussbaum said.
    Westmoreland got a strange look on his face as though he hadn’t understood Nussbaum’s words.
    “What raid on Shiloh? I didn’t order anything like that,” Westmoreland said. “What the hell is going on?”
    In a fit of rage, he grabbed the book and hurled it as hard as he could at the far wall of the room. Both men watched as it hit with a thud and fell to the floor splayed open, its binding split down the middle.

PART II
     

CHAPTER 21
     
    THE CHRISTIAN MILITANT flag furled in the wind on top of the flagpole near the visitor center at Shiloh National Military Park. No one had seen it before, but its crimson background was unmistakable. A golden cross motif separated the flag into segments. In the upper right corner was a nail-pierced hand; in the lower right quadrant, the same hand held a sword. The golden fringe was reminiscent of royalty, a concept alien to the working class people who fueled the movement with donations from their Social Security checks. Emblazoned in the flag’s background, as a foundation for everything else, were the letters CM.
    From the first day of the raid, on-lookers descended on Shiloh by the hundreds, if not thousands, only to find the two-lane access road blocked for miles in both directions by the U.S. military, which seemed content to wait things out. The Coast Guard did the same thing along the stretch of the Tennessee River that bordered the national military park. Soon the press began to call it “The Siege at Shiloh.”
    Bass Whitfield was worried about comparisons between his handling of the Shiloh Siege and the fiasco with David Koresh near Waco.
    “It’s not the same thing at all,” Leadoff said at one of their many briefings. “Koresh retreated into his compound and agents attacked him there. The CM forces mounted an invasion against a battleground revered by both sides that fought in the Civil War. We’re not bringing the fight to them. They started it. If we give them an inch, they’ll take a mile.”
    “That’s my impression, too,” Bass said.
    Sherman Aloysius spoke up. “The forces in control of the park have no resources to speak of, no artillery, few supplies. They can’t last more than a few days before we starve them out. They have released the three park employees they captured on the grounds the first day, so realistically all we could charge them with is some misdemeanor or low grade felony. We can do that to make our point when they give up,” he said.
    “General, I thought you would be the ‘let’s go kick their asses’ guy in this discussion,” Whitfield said.
    “I try not to be totally predictable, Mr. President. True military leadership always considers the peaceful, diplomatic option first. No one wants to see anybody get killed in this deal,” Sherman said. “We’ll only whip their asses if we have to. If they turn up the heat with a local militia or something along those lines, they’re toast. Until then, I say we freeze them out.”
    “Ert?” Bass said.
    “I’m with the general with one additional thing,” he said. “I think we need to send someone in to find out what their demands are, if any.”
    “I’m categorically opposed to any negotiations with these people,” Aloysius said.
    “I’m not talking about negotiating, general. I just want them to state their position. If they say something like, ‘We expect you to give control of the country to us and